Is this a bad habit? I don’t know. I’ve take to listening to lo-fi chill-hop as I write. Not sure why. It’s a recent development. Here’s a sample for you. Maybe play it as you read these words, join me where I am for a bit.
Now! Fellow writers, do you think there will ever be a day where we will become typers. Words matter, as you know. Did you know that when cinema added audio to the experience, movies were called talkies? Yet we are, as we have been, still named by the act of putting pen to paper or quill to parchment, and are therefore called writers. Admittedly I do write, in the truest sense of the word, but I do type what I write…
A rabbit hole I’ll gladly skip. Shall we move on?
This year, for the first time in in my life, I participated in NaNoWriMo. It was good experience for me, and I think it was a good experience because I knew going in that I am capable of finishing a manuscript, and had experience in doing so. Hence, I did not bloody my fingertips in trying to finish, nor was I too bothered by the fact that I got up to twenty-three thousand words, a whopping twenty-seven thousand words short of winning, by the NaNoWriMo definition. And that’s fine. The point is I wrote every day, and I learnt that I can write faster under some pressure.
But writing and storytelling to me are two different things. It is not hard to hammer out two-thousand words each day. What is difficult is writing two-thousand words, every day, for thirty days, which, when read from first to last, form a unified, satisfying reading experience, or, to put it more plainly, which, when read, form a readable story. I’m not saying that is impossible, I am saying I cannot do that in thirty days.
If I look at where I started this year, with a s$%t manuscript that was going nowhere, and many unfocussed ideas for other stories, to getting some much needed coaching from a really good writing coach, to finishing one manuscript which is an enjoyable read at least, to writing up a good third of a second manuscript during NaNoWriMo and enjoying the process, I’d call that an absolute gem of a year.
No, I’ve not found my voice, but I have found my groove.
I write daily, and that works for me. The habit has grown over the last five years, and I have no intention of stopping. This year has brought some significant changes, yet I’ve kept my stride, and have the results to show for it. For those results, I am grateful. Most importantly, I know writing is good for me, for on the days that I’m inadvertently forced to skip it — such days are few, but I am the father of a young child, a husband, and I have a career to care for — well, let’s just say that I’m in a sour mood until I write, even if it is only a hundred words.
Writing has become a part of my daily routine.
I’ll be looking ahead and back in another post towards the end of December. Wherever you are when you read this, I trust you are well, and wish for you the focus you require to do you writing today. And then again tomorrow.
Wherever you are writer, keep writing!
T.G. Ellis
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Ealisia 